Not a plea for pity

I've always wanted to sing, and in my heart, when I do, I hit notes true. Yet, when Mr. Vincent, the only male teacher in our all-girls private school, whom all the girls have a massive crush on, though he knows I know he has a crush on Sasha, on one of the male ballet dancers at Les Grand Ballet Canadiens where I study dance "seriously", and therefore, he kind likes me more than any of the other frivolous girls with their insipid emotions, listens to me sing, and instead of letting me sing one of the solos, or in the choir during our Christmas concert, we are giving in the beautiful Saint James church down the street, he gives me bells to jingle and a leather strap to snap, which I foolishly interpret as a kind of solo, until my friend Ann jokingly expounds about my tone deafness, many years later, to my teenage kids, as we rest at the top of Mount Royal Park looking down at the city, and while everyone laughs, I shrink inward because I had never been on the joke, even back then.

Dancing with angels

 “Oh human being, learn to dance,
otherwise the angels in heaven
will not know what to do with you.”

— Aurelius Augustinus

This is such a relief, for if there is one thing I know, it is how to dance. How to follow a lead. How to dance with abandon.

Will the dancing in heaven be a silent rave, each of us hearing the music inside our heads or bodies separately? The only noise heard: the creaking of bones and the occasional beatboxing beneath the breath of someone who has forgotten the rules. Or will it be a beautiful orgy of sounds, body limbs swirling, bending, sliding to the rhythm of the music?

It does not matter, I’m ready for anything. That is, if I can choose my costume: a light green satin gown of my younger body, the burnt-orange cashmere cummerbund of a mother-wife who finally loves and is loved, all draped in a midnight-blue sequined tulle of this older me, whose heart and brain are those of a warrior.

What a dancer I will be.

By the pool house

I remember the lime tree growing precariously on a small patch of grass that sloped down to the lip of the cliff. Waves broke sonorously over the reef, exposing its coral tips when the tide was low. Salted winds roared up the cliffside and over the edge, drawing the moisture from the grass and curling the fallen leaves. Only the green limes survived the battering of the elements.

The sugar pot on the corner table

Sitting at the corner table of her favourite café with one of her friends, she listens attentively to what her friend is saying, all the while sipping her tea as punctuation. The quiet within her body resembles that of a brooding hen.

Her friend folds out all her despair onto the table: the hateful words her lover spoke, how the situation had escalated into a full-blown, almighty fight, the hurt, the pleading, the slammed door, the grabbing of keys, and the sound of the car engine as he drove away. The silence of his not picking up his phone.

Her friend recounts every detail, as if rubbing away a stain that will not disappear. “Out, damned spot, out, I say!”

She is at a loss as to what she can say to her friend. She who has never loved before, never allowed herself the indulgence of deep despair or blissful pleasure. Her mind wanders away from the stream of words her friend is speaking in her direction, but not to her.

As if her friend notices the lull in attention, she stops talking and looks over, waiting for some words of consolation. She moves her gaze away from wherever it had wandered and back in the direction of her friend’s dilemma.

She accidentally tips over the sugar pot. Her friend continues talking while she scoops up the sugar and places it back into the pot.

The man outside the bakery

His morning routine passes by slowly with the ticking of the grandfather clock standing in the corner of his miniature living room.

Tick. He feeds his dog, a miniature poodle. Tock. He opens the two small windows in his tiny, dark, low-ceiling apartment, all the while the dog pit-pats beside him. Tick. Time to do a cat’s wash. Tock. He makes his bed. Tick. He gets dressed. Tock. He waters his plants. Tick. He puts on his jacket and swoops up his dog, cuddling it in the crook of his left elbow next to his beating heart.

His dishevelled looks and formless clothes speak of elder neglect and loneliness. The health of his dog and the tenderness of their relationship tell another story. Slowly, he walks across the street and sits in the corner seat outside the Turkish bakery.

At this time of day, there is no one else sitting outside at the bakery, only a constant stream of kids on their way to school, as well as adults heading to work. The old man sits there patiently with his dog on his lap, watching the neighbourhood waking to the day.

When there is finally a lull at the bakery, someone comes out with a cup of filter coffee, two sugars, and a dash of cream, and places it in front of the man. He gives a short greeting and hands over a two-euro coin. The two spend a few minutes chatting until a group of school kids, almost late for school, rush in to buy their bread rolls.

Sometime later, when tired shoppers or other older people begin to sit outdoors at the bakery’s tables, the old man and his dog go back home, leaving the empty coffee cup behind.

Reincarnation of a rugby player

Look at that idiot traipsing around. What a wimp. The old me would have ploughed him down with one shift of my shoulder. I could have stomped him into the ground and left him to be scraped up by his sissy friends. I could have taken them all on without flinching.

Bloody hell, this coat itches. Who puts a coat on a dog? God, if they only knew me back then. They’d be bloody terrified.

Photo by Erik Mclean on Unsplash

A season of stillness

She gazes out the window at the thick grey skies. These dark, short, cold days weigh upon her. She, who once danced through the summer nights with her dearest friends in mind and spirit. The DJ and bar owners had pushed them out the door with a wink and a nod. Sweating and breathless, they’d wandered the early morning streets before dawn, before lights went on in the bedrooms of the homes they passed. All the while, they hummed together the last song of the night.

For weeks now, the dark winter evenings, impenetrable to any inner light, have thrown a thick blanket of slumber and dullness over her. She feels no lightness of being. It is as if all her summer zest has flown south, somewhere along the coast of Africa.

When she meets her friends, she wonders how she ever thought their company companionable. Now she can barely tolerate their chatter, irritated by their forced gaiety. Their evening plans scrape like sandpaper against the thin surface of her civility. Were they always so superficially jovial? Was she?

Winter darkness feels like a rewiring of her brain. Somber, serious, melancholic, these grey days let other thoughts rise to the surface. Somehow, this feels more real than the wild and reckless summer sprite she once flew beside. The question is: if she digs deeper into this current state, will she discover a treasure of profound recognition, or fall into a dark abyss?

A horn blaring on the street below shakes her from her reverie. She touches her cup of tea. It’s cold. Time to cook dinner.

Sadness unshared

A young woman travelling through Europe meets a young artist in Amsterdam. He plays a sad song on a scruffy guitar. She listens, rejoicing with her whole being in the song’s words; so profoundly touched by how the songwriter manages to build and crash the hope of love eternal. Not a tale of romance gone wrong, but rather the universal tragedy of love unleashed. 

The man turns to her and says he was surprised to see such depth of sadness in her eyes as he played. He says it in a way that is half fascination, half abhorrence—wondering how she could be so very much other than all the other women he had played the song to.

She looks back at him, puzzled. Until then, she had believed everyone felt deep sadness every day. But now, that guarded look in his eyes—previously so sexually charged—makes her feel embarrassed. Shamed, even, for having shown her vulnerability.

Explore: my phone

I was listening to the interview above about slow productivity. The speaker, Dr. Cal Newport, talked a lot about deep work sessions and time boxing to do uninterrupted work. The Newport and Huberman talked about working or walking without having a telephone or email inbox nearby. 

Newport talks extensively about the futility of trying to do deep work and all the while checking your phone every few minutes. He believes, probably justifiably, that this is a type of wasteful behaviour most of us do engage in. He calls it, pseudo-productivity. No one can produce anything of note when they are constantly moving their attention away from what they are doing.

Over the last years, I've noticed that I am increasingly plugged into my phone. Since the 2016 US elections, I've stopped using Facebook and (now) X. So, it is not any social media sites that are distracting me, but WhatsApp and email.

Since leaving the company, the number of emails has decreased from over 100/day to a few notices from LinkedIn. WhatsApp is the same way. So, even though the volume has been drastically reduced, my unhealthy behavior toward my phone persists.

This is what I want to explore:

1. Start writing emails to friends again
2. Not checking my phone for the first hour of the day
3. At night, have the phone in another room
4. Occasionally, leave the house without the phone
5. During deep work sessions, put the phone somewhere else

I've noticed that many people I know do not answer their DMs immediately anymore. There may be a collective consensus that we are no longer available all the time for everyone, both at work and in private. So, whether this is true or not, I am on board!

Why I started blogging (and why I haven’t stopped yet)

I wrote my first entry for YumYumCafe at a time when blogging was still in its early bloom. I had contributed to a few other blogs, but eventually I decided to create one of my own. My idea was simple: a place where family and friends, scattered across the globe, could peek into my life.
 
Of course, there were other motivations too. First of all, it was an exciting time in the blogging world. Web 2.0 had arrived, and suddenly people who weren’t professional journalists could publish their own stories. I remember reading first-hand accounts from war zones, or artists peeling back the curtain on their creative process. It felt as though we were being invited to stand like a fly on the wall, watching people make sense of the world in real time.
 
For the first time in my life, I felt part of a wide community. And I didn’t just want to be a consumer or a commenter. I wanted to create.
 
This shift was thrilling. Up until then, the internet had been something you consumed, but blogging opened the door to being a maker. I also had a strong sense that my young children would grow up in a world shaped by this technology, in ways I couldn’t yet imagine. So, it seemed important, even in my small way, to join in.
 
The irony is that my family and friends weren’t the least bit interested in my blog. Not then, not later. But other blogger and strangers were. Over the first decade, I developed deep friendships with some bloggers. Charlotte, for example, became a dear friend, and Ronnie was a kind of mentor for several years. These connections felt more personal and honest than many of the relationships I had with neighbours or colleagues. Back then, people wrote straight from the heart. They weren’t branding themselves or curating their image. Ronnie, for example, wrote about growing old in America, and it struck me as a voice that needed to be heard.
 
Blogging was never without competition. First came MySpace, and then Facebook and the others, which blew the wind out of the sails of the blogging community. For me, the real death knell came when Google shut down its Reader. I had spent years building a library of newspapers, journalists, and bloggers to follow. And suddenly it was gone. I never found a satisfying replacement. Slowly, I stopped following other blogs, though I did keep writing my own for a while.
 
About five or six years ago, when work became overwhelming, my blog began sputtering. I told my family I was thinking of closing it down. To my surprise, both my daughter and my son urged me not to. They said it was part of my artistic legacy, even if they weren’t reading it themselves. (In the meantime, both Julien and Sara do read the blog.) That gave me a second wind. Since then, I’ve been writing more regularly again, and I’ve come to see the blog as part of who I am. Not necessarily what I produce, but the process itself: a daily act of expression. And that is precious.
 
I know Blogger is clunky and outdated, and I’ve often thought about exporting everything somewhere else. But I cling to it, partly out of loyalty, partly out of laziness. Thousands of entries later, it feels like an archive of enthusiasms, obsessions, and half-baked ideas. Sometimes I think I should tidy it up, delete obsolete posts or broken links. But Julien told me to leave them. It doesn’t need to be polished. It is what it is: an ongoing, growing archive of a life lived out loud, in public, with whoever cared to read along.
 
And, against all odds, I think I’ll continue.

She wasn't born yesterday

She struggles down the stairs at Platform 14 of Hamburg's central station. Labouring somewhat under a backpack and two carry-on suitcases, she stops halfway down the steps to catch her breath.
 
A man, maybe in his thirties, shabbily dressed, picks up one of her bags and asks whether he can carry it the rest of the way. She’s grateful yet suppresses the instinct to say, "Don't bother; I can do it." Instead, she closes her mouth into a soft smile and gives a nod of thanks for his civility.
 
At the bottom of the stairs, she hasn't even finished saying her thank-yous when he launches into an elaborate story: he and six friends were travelling south, he missed his train, and something, something, and still more—she can't quite keep the facts in order.
 
After quite a ramble, she understands that he "just needs" 12 Euros (or was it 15 or 20?) to meet up with his friends. He'll travel with her to Hannover, carry her luggage, and then be able to pay her back when they reunite there.
 
He keeps talking while she thinks: Phaah. He's standing too close. His breath smells of alcohol. He has no teeth. He's obviously high. He can't really think this will work, can he? He must live in another world where an old woman still believes these kinds of lies.
 
When he finishes his pitch, she gazes into his eyes with a measure of kindness and says, "No, thank you." They both nod, and he disappears into the crowd.
 
She lingers for a moment, then glances at a man who has been observing the encounter the whole time. She blinks, gives him a half-smile, and wanders off in the opposite direction.

Empty playground of summers past

Summer heat whiffs off the scorched grass sprouting around a carpet of hardened mud which causes bruises to limbs carelessly falling before ankles and knees can catch gravity; instead, an ooof splutters out of parted lips, mixed with embarrassed laughter, and still the game begins again.

Quiet morning

 Another post in my visual journal.

If only AI were further along… (2/2)

I wish AI could act as a prism for my wordy, muddled mind—something I could hold up to the swirling kaleidoscope of fragmented images, half-formed words, and metaphors lurking in the shadowed corners of my consciousness.

And then—voilà! Pristine, precise, and meaningful poems would blossom forth. A tweak here, a nudge there, and all those unspoken songs would finally find their voice.

If only AI were further along… (1/2)

I would love it if AI could fill our family photo albums with all those precious, everyday moments of intimacy. Moments like Giui playing World of Warcraft in the living room, with Sara sitting on one side of him and Julien on the other, watching. Or, Julien and Sara perched on the windowsill, observing the construction site below. Or, the morning sun dancing through the steam of my tea as I write in my diary on a summer day.
 
Writing the letter for Sara’s 30th birthday made me realize how few photos we have of our everyday family life. Why did the camera only appear on vacations or at big family gatherings? I suppose it was because I was too shy to bob around with a camera.

This was long before smartphones, Instagram, or selfies—back when the idea of capturing seemingly insignificant moments felt almost preposterous.
 
The phrase “making a mountain out of a molehill” comes to mind. And, admittedly, nothing dispels the quiet magic of play or solitude faster than the intrusive click of a camera lens.
 
That’s why I wish AI could be a silent observer—an invisible lens in my mind—capturing those past moments, shaping memories into form, painting them with light and colour.
 
So, where is that memories.ai app?

A chance encounter

Photo by Marius Masalar on Unsplash

On the metro ride from the airport into Helsinki, an old man sat beside me, serenely reading from an antique, voluminous book. He occasionally raised his pointer finger and waved it back and forth in a rhythmic movement.

Looking over to see what he was reading, I noticed both pages were filled with music scores for various instruments. He wasn't just reading—he was listening to a symphony on paper.

What a gift this must be, for markings on a page to ignite sounds in your brain. In an instant, this shabbily dressed individual transformed into an all-knowing maestro, directing the orchestra in his mind.

I am... a bookbinder

Photo by Mojtaba Mohammadi on Unsplash 

One of my favourite learning experiences is taking workshops with my dear friend Christine, learning the art of bookbinding from the incredibly talented Silke. There’s something magical about working with our hands—folding, stitching, and shaping paper into something beautiful and lasting. Silke, a master of her craft, shares her knowledge with grace and precision that every session feels like a lesson and an inspiration.

Spending time with Christine in this creative space makes it even more special—hours filled with laughter, learning, and the quiet satisfaction of crafting something by hand. It’s a reminder of the beauty in slowing down, honouring tradition, and the simple joy of creating.

#artists I have known: Maila Shanks

(photo: Newfoundland)

Back from the glorious morning walk, enjoying the breakfast smoothie, and have some time to tackle your questions about by life as an artist…here goes!

Dr. May Banham, an old family friend, and professor of paediatric psychology at Duke University, used to visit us in Pte-Claire, every summer, on her way home to England. She came by when I was six months old and told the folks to put a pencil in my hand asap, as it would be the best means for me to express myself and enhance my development. 

I remember drawing copiously on paper towels, which were easily accessed from a dispenser in the kitchen. The early drawings I referred to as, “action pictures”. Like cartoon strips, the characters had words in bubbles, which were short vertical lines for each word. This was a source of great frustration to me and served to accelerate my actual learning to read/write. 

Sometimes I worked out difficult emotional episodes in my life by drawing. A good example was the time I came back from my brother’s cub-scout event where I was terribly jealous of his getting lots of attention for having won a medal. Mom said I immediately reached for a paper towel and proceeded to draw a very ugly little cub-scout, beside a large, beautiful self-portrait… Voilà, mood turned from sour to delighted! 

As soon as I could read, the word, “ART” was a beacon…it always jumped out at me. I somehow knew that this was my one constant, and my best and only truly reliable friend. Everything to do with ART was of great interest to me. My father was a “commercial artist”, during the 60’s. He used to bring home all kinds of work-related paraphernalia; including the very first felt pens/sharpies; sheets of Letraset (transferable typeset in a zillion fonts); and many pots of gouache, and artist quality coloured pencils and brushes. He encouraged me to use all of it, and both parents and extended family all supported my artistic bent with constant approval and acclamation of whatever I produced. 

As I grew up, my aesthetic sensibilities were honed through exposure and time spent with my parents and teachers, discussing all manner of art, including painting, sculpture, music, literature, architecture, and photography. It all fascinated me. 

Art was not really something I shared with my peers. I had lots of friends with whom I studied at school, played sports and games with, along with various other activities. Art was always something I mostly kept to myself. I began keeping a “logbook”, when my family hit a rough patch, due to my parents’ health issues, resulting in a dramatic shift in our overall security and financial means. 

Suddenly thrown into a much darker reality, art became a veritable life raft for me. The logbook (writing and drawings) habit has stayed with me since the age of 11 years. Still have a running one, and somehow managed to keep them all, despite my vagabond-nomad life.

As I entered adulthood, art was very much a constant, if not the main focus for me. Undoubtedly, the latter was due to what I’d gleaned from my life experience thus far, which was never to put art in the role of providing my livelihood. I always maintained a very practical day job and kept my art pretty well free from any monetary involvement. People referred to me as an “artist”, but more for my demeanour and the company I kept. “Artist”, at that time, had a rather negative, somewhat seedy connotation. This always irked me. 

There was a time during my 20’s-30’s when I collaborated with artistic friends and participated in a number of exhibitions and poetry events. I had a couple of solo exhibits of my artwork as well, which I enjoyed immensely. They were well received and provided the means for framing and offering my work to a broader audience than just my friends’ circle. Yet, this seemingly positive response never ignited the ambition to become a professional artist. In fact, it almost caused the opposite reaction. 

I saw more and more people referring to themselves as “artists” who made very good money at it. This gave the “Artist” a much more acceptable guise, but the “art” seemed less authentic, more commercial, and not so interesting to me. My last exhibit was at the McGill Faculty Club, marking my having received a BFA; which secured my position as a lecturer in McGill’s Cont. Ed. Department, teaching Intensive English as a Second Language. 

I travelled extensively through Latin America (Acapulco to Tierra del Fuego, and back) in my late 20s-early-30s, in two instalments, on a very limited budget. These trips allowed me to develop all manner of life skills and self-sufficiency. There was no end to the lessons a lone gringa had to learn, that’s for sure. Lots of notes and sketches record these mystical pilgrimages. 

In my mid-30’s I went off to India, with the idea of leaving my, “teacher” persona, to that of a “student”. I’d heard that Sanskrit was the mother of all our Indo-European languages and that India was virtually another planet. That all sounded perfect, as my hometown had become a kind of playpen, too easy for me to navigate and not providing enough inner wisdom. I’ve never regretted this decision. 

While in India, I continued to do artwork, including all kinds of devotional imagery in pictures and murals. I also began to sing a lot and play some percussion instruments during traditional “kirtan” sessions. There was non-stop learning; as in these new surroundings, initially without language skills; I was humbled into a state of almost infant-like ignorance. 

Everybody was my teacher there, including animals, insects and small children. Being in such an alien environment, on my own, was indeed an opportunity to get face-to-face with my real self. All of this granted me a whole new beginning, leaving behind old notions, digging up old traumas and discarding them as I got to know my true self. What a boon! The creative process has never wavered, as I never stopped creating with all/any fabulous materials, people, and opportunities afforded me. It has been one huge, art installation after another for me.

Designing clothes, itineraries, making jewellery, co-creating several beach resorts in Goa, with Rashid…the restaurant menus, the furnishings, the huts, the staff and customers… a never-ending kaleidoscope of wonderful, kinetic, art installations! 

How many people get to do this? It’s not for everybody, mind you, as it entails having all the fear within scared out of one. Not the easiest nor most pleasant experience, but certainly invaluable, especially in retrospect. 

People often ask, “Don’t you paint anymore?”  “The painting has morphed into a whole way of life,” I lamely tell them. Perhaps with time, less mobility, and a clearer vision, I may turn to my dear ✍️ and 🎨 in order to continue to share the infinite suffering and joy I’ve experienced, and we all experience in our own unique ways. These are what life is all about.

I am... an aspiring bookbinder

(Lia's first notebook)

So, my dear friend Christine heard from a friend about a bookbinder who offers courses on bookbinding. Did I want to take a course with her? Sounded like fun, so I said yes, but I did not have any idea what it was going to be like.

Instead of spending the weekend with a group of elderly housewives in a trite community center trying to make small talk, all the while struggling to adhere to the simplest of instructions... 

Christine and I spent a magical few days with Silke, the bookbinder, working in her studio at the side of her house. She was so calm and excited at the same time and told us endless stories about the world of bookbinding. All the while, she gently walked us through the process of making our own notebooks. We couldn't help but become more and more entranced by the art of bookbinding. Now, this is a hobby I would love to do. 

We're starting slow. We've booked another few days in August. I'd like to do some sort of visual overview, a mix of photos, text, and drawings. Let's see if that happens. 

In the meantime, I am looking at all of Ido Agassi's Skillshare videos. Here are a few videos for you to get a taste of how wonderful his work is. 

I'm hooked! 

What art can be

 

The story is sublime. The characters/persons are both raw and refined. The mystery is how such a film could be made.